DUI Checkpoint Activism + College Know-Your-Rights Outreach

Recently I wrote the eulogy for Cop Block, the national police accountability activist news website. Nothing lasts forever, especially in the world of activism, where doing the right thing rarely means one can make a living at it. Burnout is real and has happened to some of the brightest activists to ever hit the Cop Block scene.

Cop Block as a national organization may have died, but it’s not dead here in New Hampshire, where it was incubated – according to founder Pete Eyre – in Keene.

Toward the end of this summer, state and local police set up DUI checkpoints in Cheshire county for the first time in five years. Thomas Parisi from The Jail Paper came out with the group to document the checkpoint. It was set up just a few hundred feet from the bridge to Brattleboro, VT so we had multiple Cop Blockers on both points of entry to the checkpoint with multiple reflective signs alerting peaceful motorists to the upcoming harassment. Not surprisingly, state police statistics reported zero DUIs were found during the checkpoint, though they did write a bunch of motor vehicle violation tickets and make a few drug possession arrests. So, all victimless “crimes” – another huge waste of taxpayer dollars.

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13 Comments

Drac Vermell
on November 20, 2017 at 6:58 pm

Boy, Jacks, you sure have a lot of Jacksisms to choose from here! I wonder which one you’ll go with? Personally, I’m betting you won’t be able to resist the opportunity to tell us that there’s no such thing as victimless crimes. Am I right, Jacks? Oh well, I guess I’ll just have to be patient and wait until tomorrow!

Copblocking is all but dead. The problem is you are not helping the problem of drunk driving but supporting it. These checkpoints work. Even if they catch one drunk driver that is one less on the road that could cause a major collision and even kill someone. A lot of the financial burden will fall on the tax payers through increase in insurance premiums and unpaid medical costs. To bad freekeeners can’t see the big picture. Many of the freekeeners have lost their drivers licenses at one time or another. That doesn’t qualify you to decide whether checkpoints are necessary or not. These checkpoints will be around for many years to come.

Drac Vermell
on November 21, 2017 at 2:51 pm

Jacks honey, keeping your insurance premiums low is not a legitimate role of government. Besides, you’re ignoring the the big picture here as well. Checkpoints force a citizen to submit to a search in order to establish if that citizen is guilty of something. No reasonable suspicion or probable cause is required here – other than the act of driving of course. You don’t think that mere driving is a suspicious activity, now do you?

Jumping Jacks
on November 21, 2017 at 3:10 pm

Ian said, ” Not surprisingly, state police statistics reported zero DUIs were found during the checkpoint, though they did write a bunch of motor vehicle violation tickets and make a few drug possession arrests. So, all victimless “crimes” – another huge waste of taxpayer dollars”. The checkpoint caught people who had drugs, and were driving illegally. The checkpoint worked.. DUI checkpoints were never set up to catch chronic drunk drivers. They were used to catch the weekend warrior drinkers who are the most problematic. 25,000 people die in the US yearly from drunk driving. Even if a few people are caught using a DUI checkpoint. It’s worth it.

Drac Vermell
on November 21, 2017 at 5:14 pm

No Jacks. DUI checkpoints are for the expressed purpose of exempting police officers from the rules usually required for the collection of evidence; evidence that would otherwise be insubmissible under the exclusionary rule. So in a sense they do “work,” Jacks, in so far as they allow police a way to avoid the disincentives they face from illegally gathering evidence.

Ok sure
on November 21, 2017 at 6:27 pm

DUI Checkpoint Activism is a diversion for the “folder of girls” Ian has on his personal computer. Quite disturbing don’t you think?

Ernest
on November 21, 2017 at 6:56 pm

“Copblock as a national organization may have died”. I wonder why that is? Is it because it was founded and run by a bunch of lowlife’s without any intestinal fortitude?

Jumping Jacks: You need to do some research. DUI arrests (and convictions) go down when police do checkpoints. It is a combination of the police putting their entire dept in one spot, and inefficiently stopping all drivers instead of using their training to detect traffic offenses that are more likely to lead to a DWI arrest. Even when someone is arrested for DUI at a checkpoint, the conviction rate is much lower since the cases are easier to win from a criminal defense lawyer standpoint because there is no bad driving.

I See Dopes
on December 2, 2017 at 4:12 pm

CopBlock was started by two Koch corporation minions to find ways to privatize policing so The privilege class ie white men are made exempt of law